The Grand Illusion
Maybe I’m missing something, but I was under the impression that one of the “benefits” of satellite networks like Direct TV and Dish was to obtain programming free of all those annoying ads, but now ads are appearing in the middle of movies – even movies made decades ago. And while the profits of Hollywood studios are down, those of Netflix, Amazon, and a few others are way up.
Ad breaks used to be a few minutes, but on satellite and cable networks, now they’re often five minutes long. And sports TV/internet is now using split-screen technology so that you get a silent picture of the “action” on one side and a loud commercial on the other side. And yes, advertising revenues are way, way up.
And, oh, yes, my monthly internet access bill went up 40%, unannounced, last month.
So, with all the revenues from this vast array of news and entertainment going up and up, exactly why are the real content providers, i.e., the writers and actors (the majority of them, not the super high-paid stars) getting stiffed and striking? And why do the media giants complain that they can’t afford real people? To pay for the exorbitant pay of high executives, perhaps?
As a provider of entertainment content myself, I can see that the list price of one of my fantasy hardcovers has gone from $21 in 1991 to $32 in 2023, an increase of slightly more than 50%. That’s over 32 years, which amounts to an increase of 34 cents a year, or an annual price increase of under 2% (not exactly exorbitant). In the meantime, my property taxes have doubled, and to replace my 2009 SUV would cost twice much as I paid for it.
But I’m one of the more fortunate authors. I know a number who no longer can make a living from their writing or who couldn’t save enough and afford good enough health insurance and who’ve been financially and sometimes physically destroyed. I’ve seen editors sacked by publisher after publisher, with downsizing after downsizing.
And, unhappily, this isn’t just happening in the entertainment industry. The IT industry is famous for hiring young talent comparatively cheaply and then laying off more experienced (and higher paid) technical staff in their forties and fifties, and sometimes younger.
Academia used to rely on the expertise of tenured professors. Now those positions comprise less than a third of university teachers, and are declining every year, while the majority of undergraduates are taught by part-time adjuncts, who get no health or retirement benefits and have no idea whether they’ll have a job in the next semester.
At some point, all these comparatively underpaid workers will no longer be able to service the debt that they’ve built up while struggling for better pay and job security… and then what?
As Marie Antoinette is supposed to have said, “Let them eat cake” when the peasants could not afford bread. In hindsight probably not a good decision. Will the US get to that point?
Maybe our lords and masters can keep the propaganda, circuses and foreign wars going so the people don’t notice that the oligarchs have already bought the government until you hear the click of the lock on your collar.
I am one of those senior IT who actually helped train my foreign cheaper replacements.
It is all about the bonuses. Corporate activity is based on the bonus and promotion cycle. Every department has their own goals. In a sane corporation the goals align but in most companies the goals are localized. For example, the procurement department will have a goal of reducing all bills by 20%. This means that every purchase is held up until that reduction is achieved. I have seen critically needed tools held up for months because of a $1000. A company may lose 10 times that amount daily but since losses like that are not calculated anywhere there is no leverage. The same thing happens with travel policies back when there was travel. Companies will instruct travelers that they should take the lowest fare even if there is a layover involved. I used to travel between Atlanta and Seattle frequently. A direct flight took about 5 hours, but a one stop flight would take 8. If I took the direct flight, I could still get in a half day of work but not so much on the one stop flight. The savings of $200 on the ticket price which was not the discounted price that the company actually paid did not come close to cover a half days pay let alone the opportunity cost. But someone bonus depended on cutting travel costs but was not affected lost opportunities.
The reason the creatives get treated poorly and commercials are added to streaming is that the people making those decisions are not affected by the quality of the product or whether people leave the service. Their bonus is going to be based on something like the average revenue per customer. Adding commercials and raising the costs will increase their bonus.
The same kind of activity happens everywhere such as in IT companies getting rid of experienced workers in favor of young ones or using adjunct faculty. The people making these short-term decisions don’t ever feel the effect of them. Most of the time they get their bonus and/or promotion and then move to another company where they repeat the process.